The Secret Formula for Internet Writers

"...I am just about desperate here....I have been reading and re-reading your blog. I have been writing online (feverishly) for over 2 years. I get that residual pay takes time. What I don't get is what I am doing wrong....I try writing about timely/popular subjects...excuse me for mostly writing from my heart but that is what I do. Can I not expect to earn money unless I figure out the "secret" formula for success?"

The above is a message I received yesterday from a fellow internet writer. My heart went out to this writer. I've been there, frantically looking for "the secret formula for success."  The one thing I have learned from years of internet writing is that there is not one secret formula. There are several formulas, none of them secret, that must be mixed and matched with each other to fit each individual internet writer and their internet articles. These are just a few of those formulas I've discovered:

• Write Every Day - Internet writers must write every day. Whether it is published or not, we must produce new content every single day. This is part of honing our craft - improving our work. As internet writers write each day, we must see improvement. Internet writers must learn from their mistakes and not repeat them.

• The Devil is in the Details - Yes, it is true that the devil is in the details. No one is writing "War and Peace" or "Gone With the Wind" for the internet - it is all short snippets that will fit into our hectic lives and crazy schedules. Despite this, internet writers must weigh the details that will fill their "snippets" and make their concise and clear internet articles even more concise and clear.

• Original Only - Internet writers must produce original internet articles. We can't being writing duplicate or "almost the same" content as others. With millions of internet writers out there, we must put our unique spin on everything we write. The personality and spirit of the individual internet writer must shine through. The only way I know to do this is to write from the heart. If you aren't writing from the heart, you are missing the boat and the potential of a profitable career of an internet writer.

• Trial and Error - All writing, especially internet writing, is trial and error. My "writing philosophy" is quite simple: Throw everything against the wall and see what sticks. What works for one internet writer may not work for another internet writer. Yes, there are rules all internet writers should follow. Think of the old Air Supply song..."I know all the rules and I know how to break them and I always know the name of the game." The name of the game is "Making Money" and, as internet writers, we must break some rules to win that game.

• SEO - Always have SEO on your mind. I have Post-It notes on my edges of my computer screen, reminding me of SEO. Internet writers can't forget that SEO is what gets their internet articles indexed by search engines and increases your page rank. Without both, you will struggle with earning a living as an internet writer.

• Keywords - As with SEO, internet writers must be mindful of keywords. Use them and use them wisely. Use the keyword tools available to internet writers online. Pay attention to the specific keywords you use and their ratio in your internet articles. Avoid using too many different keywords in individual internet articles. Use trial and error to find the mix that works best for you.

• Branding - Internet writers must brand themselves and their work. This is key; an internet writer must be remembered by their readers. Develop your specific brand and stick with it. Use that brand to increase your readership. As your readership increases, so will your earnings.

• Promotion -Internet writers must promote their work! Never count on getting indexed on the first page of major search engines. This does happen and it happens often, but you must promote your work to help the search engines pick up your internet articles. Use Twitter, Facebook, Digg and other forms of social networking sites to increase your page views. The more page views you have, the more like you are to make money.

If I had "the secret formula," I would have it in bottles on shelves everywhere and the internet would be saturated with this formula. The formula would have a pretty bow on it and a nice price tag. I don't formula. Personally, I don't think it exists. You will see so-called formulas all over the place. Many of them will have giant price tags on them. Please don't fall for it. The internet is always evolving and changing; our internet writing should do the same. Because of that, those secret formulas are often outdated and obsolete. What what last year or last week may not work today, tomorrow or in six months. As internet writers, we must learn to adapt and change. We must hone and craft, constantly "putting it out there" for the world to read.

Internet Writing: Your Never-Ending Job Interview

Internet writers must understand that the internet articles they post can remain online for as long as the world wide web exists. Readers can access internet articles for decades, centuries perhaps. Internet writers must always produce internet articles of the highest quality.

Of course, there is a learning curve. As internet writers grow as writers and hone their online article writing skills, their articles will improve. In fact, every internet article must be better than the last. This is a daunting task. It isn't easy to produce ever-improving internet articles.

I consider internet writing to be a never-ending job interview. Readers will begin to notice you and your work. This is especially true if you have properly branded yourself and your work. Readers will judge your work based on your other work and other internet articles they have read as well as by their own standards. Based on their opinions of your work, they will be deciding if they want to continue reading - hiring you as their "personal internet writer."

The quality of your internet articles must always be of the highest caliber. There is little, if any room, for errors. I am a firm believer that it is best to have one quality internet article than several low-quality internet articles. Those low-quality articles may earn your money and readers in the short-term, but do all sorts of long-term damage that can not be corrected. Internet writers must remember that they are only as good as the worst online article they have written.

Tips for Using Live Keyword Analysis

I couldn't be happier when I use LiveKeywordAnalysis. It is the easiest and fastest way that I have found to tweak my keyword density. This is just a little information about this great tool that is such a big help to me. I find it to be a must for online writers. The purpose of LiveKeywordAnalysis is to figure out your keyword density. It will tell you the exact ratio of the keywords in your online article. Knowing your keyword density is essential for SEO. Too many keywords and search engines will consider your online article to be spam. Not enough keywords and your online article will be indexed incorrectly, if it is even indexed by search engines.

What I love most about LiveKeywordAnalysis is the fact is it is so easy to use. I simply type my online article on a Word document, which I do anyway, and then copy/paste it to LiveKeywordAnalysis. I then type in the keyword I need to the ratio information about and VIOLA! it is done. If my keyword density is too low or too , I add or delete the keyword directly on the page. Once I have the ratio I want, I simply replace the old online article with the new one on the Word document and publish when I am ready.

Another thing about about LiveKeywordAnalysis is that isn't muddled with all sorts of other options and gadgets I do not want. It doesn't tell me how many times I've used the world "the" or the number of sentences are in my online article. I don't use that sort of information for my online work and I don't want to spend time sifting through it to get to the information I want.

Give LiveKeywordAnalysis a try and see how it works for you. I know you will love it as well. It makes SEO much easier and easier it always better, especially when it comes to online writing and making money with your online writing. It will help you get the ratio of keywords exactly where you want it and you will see the difference in where you find your online articles on search engines, your traffic and your earnings.

Where to Promote Your Online Articles

Promoting your online articles is key to being a successful online writer. Promoting your work serves two purposes - immediate results and long-term results. The immediate results is the "instant" readers your online articles will have. The long-term results are how those page views will increase the chances your online articles will be indexed by search engines. These are just a few different places where online writers can promote their online articles.

• Search Engines - Add you online articles individually to search engines such as Google, Bing, Yahoo and MSN. To add your online article's URL to Google, simply click here and then follow the directions. For the other search engines, simply search "add my URL to" the specific site to find out how to go about adding your online articles. You can also use several different free services that will add will add your online articles to several different search engines. My personal favorite is Jayde. Simply sign up for their free service and start adding the URLs to your online articles. Ping is another free service you can use. They offer a paid membership as well. With the freebie from Ping, unlike Jayde which is limitless, you can only add up to five URLs per day. You will be pleasantly surprised at how quickly you see a difference in your page views and, eventually, your earnings.

• Social Networking Sites -  Take advantage of all the social networking websites available. These include Twitter and Facebook. Follow or "befriend" anyone and everyone and post the links to your online articles in your Twitter stream and on your Facebook wall. Remember to interact with others on the social networking sites. Not only will this help you increase your following, it will always help you find topics to write about - topics others will want to read.

• Bookmarking Sites - Use the different bookmarking sites to help you get indexed on search engines and increase the page views of your online articles. Mixx, Delicious, Digg, and Reddit are just a few I use. I also use StumbleUpon, but be careful not to add URLs from the same writing site; they will consider this spam and ban your from using their site. I also use Google Bookmarks and find it to be quite effective. RedGage is a different type of bookmarking site. Not only can online writers add the links to their online articles, you can earn money doing it. It isn't a lot of money, but you might as well make some extra cash when you promote your online articles.

My personal favorite bookmarking site is IMAutomator. As with everything I do online, it is free to use. I can add 10 URLs per day for each account I have with them. All you need for multiple accounts is multiple email accounts - just a hint, one online writer to another. You can purchase the "Pro Version," if you like. My results from this bookmarking site have been so great, I am considering purchasing the upgrade. It is easy to use and lets you decide how quickly your want your online articles to be added. I always go with the 15 days option, unless my online article is seasonal and must be bookmarked quickly. If that is the case, then I go with the one day option. When you submit your online article's URL, it will pull the title, description and tags from that URL automatically. Talk about easy! I love it and love the results - my page views and earnings have dramatically and drastically increased since I started using it. My online articles I have added to IMAutomator are on the first page of search engines, including Google, Bing and Yahoo.

Promoting each and every one of your online articles takes time and effort. It has been my experience that the results are well worth it. Once you set up a routine for promoting your online articles, it gets much faster. Online writers who promote their online articles can go from making pennies each day to making dollars every day. I know because I have done it. Unless you don't want to make money with your online articles, there is no reason not to promote it as much as possible.

Keyword of the Day - Sex

The keyword for January 18th is sex. And, it isn't the keyword of the day for the reasons the other keywords of the day have been mentioned. This is a warning of keywords to avoid. At the time this is published, sex has a CPC of 41 cents and has 338,000,000 monthly searches. The CPC for sex is extremely low, but the global monthly searches sounds promising. But, there is a catch...

Google "sex," without the quotation marks. In the results of that search you will find "about 790,000,000 results." Oops. That is a gigantic problem. Yes, you and I are wonderful and talented online writers, but do you really want to try to get on the first page of Google knowing that you have to make your way from the bottom of that many other online articles, websites, and photos about sex? This online writer prefers to take her chances getting on the first page of search engines with another keyword.

That doesn't mean I ignore sex all together. In fact, I've  recently written two online articles with "sexy" in the title. Yes, this proves I am truly "keyword crazy!" I put a different spin on sexy and wrote an online article that made it to the first page of Google. Of course, it may not be there in a few hours, but it is right now.

How did I do that? Well, I not only did I think outside the box, I poured a little gasoline on the box and tossed in a nuclear bomb. I wrote "The Top Tips for Becoming a Sexy Redneck Man." By changing the keyword slightly from "sex" to "sexy redneck" (no quotations) and pairing it with something unusual, I went from "about 790,000,000 results" to "about 958,000 results" on Google. When I search "sexy," minus the quotations, I found 361,000,000 results and not a redneck in sight. I was surprised to learn that "sexy redneck" has a CPC of five cents. Yes, one whole nickle.

"Am I making money?" That is question everyone wants to know. Seeing I published this online article less than 48 hours ago, I can say not yet. I don't know if I ever will. Of course I want to make money with this online article, but it was more an experiment than a money-making endeavor. I was curious if I could make the front page of Google Search with a keyword that is "over-searched."

Yes, this is still a warning not to use sex as a keyword. Unless, you can figure out a way to mix it up a bit and do the almost impossible. I'm not saying it can't be done or you shouldn't try. I'm simply saying that there are probably better keywords to use that will be more profitable for you.

Branding Yourself as an Online Writer

When you look around, you will see brands everywhere. From the shoes on your feet to the light bulbs that you use, brands are everywhere. As an online writer, you should also have a brand. It will make you more recognizable which, in turn, will get more readers to your online work.

Branding yourself can be challenging, but is isn't as difficult as you might think. This is especially true if your are a niche writer. When your online articles falls into a niche, that niche can take on the role of your brand. For those of us who are not niche writers, it may take a little time to come up with a brand that suits us, our online writing and our writing style.

I have worked hard at branding myself. Once I realized that "online writing gigs" were profitable, I knew I had to brand myself and my work. By that time, I had established myself as a "non-niche writer" and there was no turning back. I had to find a way to make myself stand out from the millions of other online writers my readers could turn to.

I had to figure out what made me different from all other online writers and use that to my advantage. I had a few things going for me from the start - an unusual name, a cute little dog as an avatar and a nickname I had for years. I knew I had to make those three things work together as my individual brand as an online writer.

• Emma Riley Sutton - When I first started writing, I was simply Emma Sutton. I did a Google search and learned there was an English actress that shared my name. I knew that even if I could compete with her and her career, I would get lost in all her acting credits when it came to online searches. I added my middle name and the rest is history. 

• Maisie -  Because of my personal safety issues, I never use a photograph of myself. I started using a photo of my service dog, Maisie, instead. I was constantly getting "oh, what a cute dog" comments and emails from all over the world. Maisie now served a new purpose - the face to my work. It also helped that I was doing a lot of writing about animals and animal issues. This was working well for me.

• The Queen of Useless Information -  I've been known for years as "The Queen of Useless Information" by friends and family members. Because I am not a niche writer and really have no interest in pigeon holing myself into one or two categories, I began using this nickname. This is working great. If my readers do not remember my name or Maisie's photo, they know my nickname. As my online portfolio grows and covers more and more unrelated topics, The Queen of Useless Information suits me better and better.

I played to my strengths when began branding myself. You should do the same. Consider all the things that you do well as an online writer and find a brand for yourself that encompasses as many of them as possible. Take a look at your online writing style and create a brand that will complement your unique style.

Another important key, perhaps the most important key, to branding yourself is using one name and one name only. You want your readers, your fan base, to be able to easily access all of your online articles. When you use more than one name, it is difficult for them to find your body of work in one place - such as search engines like Google and Bing. Keep in mind that many readers do not understand that writers often use pen names and those who do will not understand why you would use more than one name.

Discovering your brand can take some time. Work on it daily and find the brand that will work best for you. By creating a brand for yourself, you will see much more profitable your online writing can be.